Car, signboard catch fire at airport

CHENNAI: Tension prevailed outside the Chennai Airport terminal as a departing taxi cab and the electric signboard outside a vegetarian restaurant went up in flames in the early hours of Friday. Witnesses at the airport recounted that a private cab that was dropping off Jet Airways staff at the domestic terminal, stopped a little way after it began pulling out of the alighting bay.The driver noticed smoke coming out of the engine, following which he attempted to examine what the problem was. A little after 4 am, fumes suddenly erupted from the car’s engine and began spreading across the bonnet. Within minutes, the entire front portion the car was burnt. Airport officials said the firefighters arrived within 10 minutes and managed to contain the flames. Airport police attributed the fire to an electrical fault, though they strongly suspected some problem in the air conditioning unit.Barely 45 minutes after the incident, there was a minor scare at the International terminal when the neon signboard outside a restaurant there short circuited and went up in flames. The wiring will be rechecked on the entire line before the new portions of the airport are inaugurated, said a senior AAI official. As this is the eighth such incident, the checks will be done once the wet weather lifts. No one was injured.